WASHINGTON, Sept 8 (NNN-AGENCIES) – US President Donald Trump is suspending planned peace talks with the Taliban, he said on Twitter on Saturday.
Trump said planned secret, separate meetings with major Taliban leaders and with Afghan President Ashraf Ghani, meant to take place at Camp David on Sunday, would be cancelled and peace talks with the Taliban suspended.
The US president charged that “unfortunately, in order to build false leverage, they [the Taliban] admitted to an attack in Kabul that killed one of our great great soldiers, and 11 other people.”
“I immediately cancelled the meeting and called off peace negotiations,” Trump added. “What kind of people would kill so many in order to seemingly strengthen their bargaining position?”
“If they [the Taliban] cannot agree to a ceasefire during these very important peace talks, and would even kill 12 innocent people, then they probably don’t have the power to negotiate a meaningful agreement anyway,” Trump asserted.
Two NATO soldiers, one US and one Romanian, were among 12 people killed in the car bombing at a security post near NATO’s Resolute Support mission headquarters in Kabul on Thursday.
Whether this means that negotiations between Washington and the Taliban militants are over for good remains to be seen.
The US and the Taliban have been meeting since last year in the hopes of bringing to an end to the Afghanistan conflict that has been raging for nearly two decades.
Last week, a Taliban spokesman said they were “close” to a deal with the US as the two sides negotiate in the Qatari capital, Doha.
On Wednesday, the US special envoy for Afghanistan, Zalmay Khalilzad, shared a draft agreement with the Afghan government. Khalilzad had been in Kabul to discuss the deal agreed in principle between the US and Taliban.
Khalilzad said at the time that a final deal could be announced within the next few days, but would need the US president’s approval.
The draft agreement called for the US to withdraw 5,000 US soldiers from Afghanistan in 135 days as a first installment.
It also called for the Taliban to enter into direct talks with the Afghan government, a step the militants have so far refused to take as they consider Ghani’s government to be “puppets” of Washington.
The Afghan government in an initial reaction had warned of the “dangers” of the proposed agreement between the United States and the militants.
Presidential palace spokesman Sediq Sediqqi wrote on Twitter that the government was concerned about the “unpleasant dangers and consequences” that the deal could bring if it were signed.
NNN-AGENCIES